stories

That's mostly what I came to Missouri for -- my father's stories. He just turned 96. This man can remember an amazing amount of information about his life and the community he has lived in all this time. He talks non-stop in a rambling way, moving between generations and subjects.

Yesterday we spent about two hours together, digital recorder running so that I can capture his voice. My job was to ask prompting questions, and then listen. His was to talk. At about noon I suggested that we take a break until after dinner (lunch is dinner on the farm). He said, "Well... no, you want to talk some more?" which really meant, 'you want to listen some more?' With that he lay back down on his day bed and waited for me to ask the next question.

His stories come to life in the telling, and so does he. Another resurrection.

Homecoming

There's a tradition in the little country church where I grew up. Every Memorial Day weekend former members and pastors are invited to bring their families back to McCroskie Creek Baptist Church for a reunion. The day includes the usual Sunday school and morning worship followed by a huge carry-in dinner and an afternoon service that begins with a memorial to the members of the church who are now deceased, with special recognition for those who have served in the United States military. This year Shirley (about 10 years my junior) led the memorial. She broadened the time of remembering to include living heroes in the church as well, naming their service in the church as having changed the lives of all of us who grew up in the congregation. She said this was a place full of people who always accepted us and welcomed us back no matter how badly we messed up.

Cora Lou said something similar before singing her solo during the worship service. She is more than a decade my senior. She said that this little church not only shaped and grounded her -- it is because of this church that her children, the next generation, who grew up far away, became the people they are. McCroskie Creek created a foundation for people generations removed.

Dixie said that the love and support that this congregation gives to her mother, Marg, who struggles with the effects of cancer and Alzheimers is what sustains her. Even on the days that Marg seems not to recognize her daughter as she thanks her for coming by, she remembers and talks about the church.

My great-neice Lily was baptized yesterday. Tommy (in his mid-70s) remembers when he baby-sat me! Susie tells me she is now retired, substitute teaching sometimes and tending her consignment booth at an antique store. Pat and Holly, whose band included guitar, mandolin, banjo, bass and great vocal harmony, were amazed to see my grown daughters and their children (they led music for church camp when my kids were young).

I spent the day in a dizzying time warp, a baby when I became part of that church, a grandmother when I returned. A welcoming community... that's what a church at its best can be... a spiritual home.

Day one of the journey...

My bags are packed, food and drinks prepared so I won't have to stop except when the car gets hungry. It's going to be fun logging the mpg this little hybrid gets on her way to and from Missouri. I'll get a few hours of sleep this evening, and then in the wee hours of the morning I'll be heading out across the country.

I hope to find some time for just-for-fun reading in the next few weeks. To that end, I'm taking along a couple of books by Diana Gabaldon, a Phoenix author -- great adventure, mythical, a little racey. I am NOT taking along any lectionary resources... just a Bible. I also tucked in a copy of Homer's "The Odyssey." Not exactly light reading, but I thought it might be an appropriate book for a trip such as this -- an exploration without a tight schedule, a meandering kind of journey.

A few years ago when Jim Sterling was serving on the committee that helped plan my ordination service, he gifted me with the following reflection called "The Journey." In Greek mythology, the island of Ithaca is a symbol of ultimate destination, toward which Odysseus makes his way through complicated and perilous adventure.

"When you set out for Ithaka
ask that your way be long,
full of adventure, full of instruction
.............
ports seen for the first time...
.............
to gather stores of knowledge from the learned.
Have Ithaka always in your mind.
Your arrival there is what you are destined for.
But do not in the least hurry the journey.
Better that it should last for years,
so that when you reach the island you are old,
rich with all you have gained on the way,
not expecting Ithaka to give you wealth.
Ithaka gave you the splendid journey.
Without her you would not have set out...

Be sure to write to us here at the blog when you set out for your Ithaca, and let us all know where the journey takes you.

See you in August.

Hiking Mt. Whitney

As Linda mentioned..I will be backpacking to the top of Mt. Whitney, located in Lone Pine, CA on June 6-8, 2008; It is the highest peak in the lower 48 states...topping out at 14,497. I will be tackling this adventure with a friend of mine-Melissa. She and I will be going on a guided tour with Sierra Mountaineering International-I believe including the guides there will be 8 of us. I have day hiked around AZ and NM--but never anything quite like this...we'll be carrying 20-40lbs on our back, we will be using crampons and ice axe (for the snowy conditions)..we will be wearing harnesses, ropes, etc as we make our final ascent to the top via the Mountaineers Route. Their are many ways to get to the top--this just happens to be one of the more "difficult" routes...We've been training for the last couple of months now--and feel very much prepared for what lies ahead..Day one we hike to UpperBoy scout lake (11,000)-and put up camp...Day 2 we "chute" the summit and then back down to camp for the night...Day 3-we pack up camp and head back to Whitney portal (8,000) in time for a nice lunch or dinner I suspect...it will be amazing--and my prayer is a safe and exciting trip-to the top...and then of course safe travels back "home"...Your thoughts and prayers would be much appreciated!!!!

Wherever you go, there you are!

God, you have been our dwelling place in all generations. Before the mountains were brought forth, or ever you had formed the earth and the world, from everlasting to everlasting you are God. --Psalm 90:1-2

This is the day our sabbatical officially begins. I say "our" because we have all been commissioned to lay down some of our busy-ness this summer and learn to rest... be renewed.

For me, this first day is a transitional day -- still a few tasks to finish before I can leave. So it's a busy day; not yet a restful day. Someone asked me yesterday if I'm excited yet. I've been excited for a while. Right now I'm just a little anxious, and expect that will dissipate when I've tied up these loose ends, packed the car and headed out.

It's too full a day to think creatively. So for today I'll post an excerpt from one of my favorite worship resources, a three-volume series called Imaging the Word from United Church Press in Cleveland, OH. This is from Volume 3, p. 54. There is a quote from Douglas Meeks ("Love and the Hope for a Just Society," in Burnham, McCoy, and Meeks, Love: The Foundation in the Theology of Jurgen Moltmann and Elizabeth Moltmann-Wendel, San Francisco: Harper & Row, 1988, 44, 45.)

"We have all had at least fleetingly, an experience of home. Home is where no one ever forgets your name. Home is where no matter what you have done, you will be confronted, forgiven,and accepted. Home is where there is always a place for you at the table.... The heart of justice is participation in God's economy or God's household."

Some of us have more of a longing for home than a memory of home. Some of us have heard of it, read what others had to say about it, but haven't yet found the place where there is such grace that regardless of what we've done, we will be "forgiven and accepted." Maybe the "confronted" part was all you ever got. So if you're still looking for home today, I'm thinking of you especially. I'm praying that you'll find a place that feels like home.

So glad you dropped in!

Hi, Andi & Amy! What fun to read your posts! Keep it up. Can't wait to read about everyone's adventures this summer!

Andi, the Rocky Point sun shows on your face! What a great adventure on the beach. Congratulations!

Amy, the description you sent me of your upcoming backpacking trip is amazing. You really must post a report when you're back -- in fact, tell the story now! You must be very excited to have your sister moving here -- to be close to those babies! Love to you & Trish -- I miss you -- see you in the fall!

L

New to this...

I've just been invited to this blog--and have never been blogging before..so here goes. Andi-your trip to rocky point sounds wonderful--a girl after my own heart--the beach, a triathalon, and bonding with the girls--how awesome is that..! Being born and raised in KC myself, I can relate to alot of the stories of Linda...I think the dinner "table" is a very special place--it always was for our family as well..As far as "going home....coming home"...as you all know-Trish and I haven't been to church in well over a year now. We think of Chalice often...we drive by your home daily...we feel a connection to the congregation..we love you all...and I know that we consider Chalice our "home"..(that we don't visit very often...:) However, my sister and her family are moving here at the end of the month..I know that they will be looking for a church family...and I am certainly going to recommend Chalice...and of course--being the good aunt(s) we are, we too would join them...so--I guess in a sense, we'll be coming home as well....

I'm refreshed!

So I didn't exactly go home, but I did get refreshed! Tara and I and 3 other girls (because of course we aren't old enough to be called women!) traveled to Rocky Point Mexico for a girls getaway. The getaway included a triathlon, a wonderful condo in front of the pool and lots of quality bonding time on the beach. We returned to our families with renewed energy and slightly sunburned cheeks. It was such a wonderful trip we are hoping to make it an annual event!

Andi

Going Home… to a Place of Hospitality

Luke 10:38-42
Now as they went on their way, he entered a certain village, where a woman named Martha welcomed him into her home. She had a sister named Mary, who sat at the Lord’s feet and listened to what he was saying. But Martha was distracted by her many tasks; so she came to him and asked, ‘Lord, do you not care that my sister has left me to do all the work by myself? Tell her then to help me.’ But the Lord answered her, ‘Martha, Martha, you are worried and distracted by many things; there is need of only one thing. Mary has chosen the better part, which will not be taken away from her.’


There is a table with three leaves that sits in the kitchen at my parent’s home. Most of the time the three leaves live in the hall closet, but when company comes, we bring them out and the table expands to welcome relatives and friends. At Thanksgiving it was always hard to guess who would be sitting around that table. Everyone in the community who didn’t have somewhere else to be was invited. Former pastors still drop by unannounced and Mother just adds another plate to the table so they can share the meal. There is magic about this table. At this table four hot vegetables, a big bowl of potatoes, two plates of meat, four salads, a bowl of pickled beets, a cake and two pies can disappear in no time.

This is the same table where informal family meetings happen daily to discuss the farming that needs to be done, the cattle to be moved to another pasture, the cost of seed corn and fertilizer, and whether to contract this summer to sell the beans at a better price. This is the table where I answered to questions about my grade card and reported on whether my chores were done. It is the place where my father wrote in his journal, leaving an account of life on the farm.

At home I learned how important a table can be. The table in my parents’ kitchen where we are nourished is also the table that orders our life… reminds me of communion at church. It is a blessed place. This is a table that is always open. This is a table that says “welcome home.”

Going Home… Where Fireflies Light the Summer Nights

Summer nights. All the farm machinery idle, tractors and trucks in the shed. Silence filtering in with nothing to anchor it but a soft breeze. Interrupted now and then by locusts… the sound of crickets. Now the neighbor’s dog barking, distant, probably at a raccoon stealing sweet corn.

The time before we had an indoor bathroom… a galvanized metal tub sitting in the yard. Laughter. My brother Norman’s laughter, when he scooped up a double handful of bathwater from the tub and aimed it at me… at me! fresh and clean and newly dried, in my underpants and shirt. Laughter, Norman’s laughter as he ran around the yard with all his strength to get away from me. Scrawny kid! I loved him with a love so big it made me run faster.

Cool evening air, brushing past my arms and face, making the tiny hairs on my skin stand up straight. Evening air sweet with the smell of growing things and rich black earth, velvety grass. Velvety grass between my toes. Night wrapping us in its soft black veil, interrupted only by stars and the fireflies. There’s nothing like an evening of chasing “lightning bugs.” Magical insects with their yellow-green lights flying away before we could catch them, flirting with us… and then we would catch them… and pinch off their backsides while the light still glowed, and the sticky stuff from inside them made the glowing part cling to my finger like a diamond ring.

I’m going home.

Going Home... to An Inhabited Town

Psalm 107
O give thanks to God who is good, and whose steadfast love endures forever. Let those redeemed from trouble say so, whom God gathered in from the lands, from the east and from the west, from the north and from the south. Some wandered in desert wastes, finding no way to an inhabited town; hungry and thirsty, their soul fainted within them. Then they cried out in their trouble and God delivered them from their distress, leading them by a straight way, until they reached an inhabited town. Let them thank God for such steadfast love and wonderful works to humankind. For God satisfies the thirsty and fills the hungry with good things.


I grew up in a farming community in Missouri, about 70 miles east of Kansas City. Tucked away there between the green rolling hills is a little town called Norborne. In those days the population was 1000. There I finished elementary school, junior high and high school. That’s where I learned to play clarinet and held first chair, sang in the choir, played and sang in small ensembles and solos for contests, produced copy and layout for yearbooks, cheered at football games, debated both pro and con on national topics, learned to conjugate Latin (amare, amo, amas, amat – I love!), played bass drum in marching band (what was that about?) had the lead role in a couple of plays, and almost beat Ronnie Lyon in a race for student body president. He never let me forget it!

The Psalmist talks about people wandering in wastelands, finding no way to an inhabited town. This summer, very soon, I’ll load up my little Prius and drive the long road home to an inhabited town. The town has changed. The drug store is closed where we used to walk after school for an order of fries and a drink from the soda fountain. Vanilla phosphate was my preference. Norborne may be smaller, and many of the people I knew are no longer there, but there are memories sleeping in the doorways and on the corner lot where the bandstand used to be, where we played on summer nights for the shoppers who had come to town. I plan to wake up some of those memories and shake the dust off them.

The Psalmist says, ‘hungry and thirsty, their soul fainted within them.’ Every year there was a fair in Norborne where the best produce from everyone’s garden was carted carefully to be put up beside the neighbor’s produce and judged. The best got blue ribbons. The best of the best got Best of Show. Hardly anyone in that little town went hungry. There was plenty to go around and hearts generous enough to share.

When I think of the tastes of home, I always think of peanut rolls. I’ve never eaten a peanut roll anywhere else that I’ve lived or traveled – as far as I know they are native to Norborne. My mother-in-law, Edith, made some of the best. Pep Club sold them at football games as a fundraiser. I’ll have to make you some sometime. Very soon I'm going back to a little hometown that's inhabited by good cooks and remarkable memories.

Going Home... to Where I Caught Faith

2 Timothy 1:3-7
I am grateful to God – whom I worship with a clear conscience, as my ancestors did – when I remember you constantly in my prayers night and day. Recalling your tears, I long to see you so that I may be filled with joy. I am reminded of your sincere faith, a faith that lived first in your grandmother Lois and your mother Eunice and now, I am sure, lives in you. For this reason I remind you to rekindle the gift of God that is within you through the laying on of my hands; for God did not give us a spirit of cowardice, but rather a spirit of power and of love and of self-discipline.


Before coming to Arizona 12 years ago I was actively involved at North Oak Christian Church in Kansas City. It was a great congregation, about the size of Chalice, with a building a lot like this one. They just finished remodeling and I can’t wait to see it. North Oak will be one of the churches I visit on sabbatical. For the 14 years that my daughters and I were members there the pastor was Rick Butler, one of the best preachers I ever heard. As I was fretting one day about program planning for the church he shared one of his bits of wisdom: “Faith is better caught than taught.” That, by the way, is why your congregation needs you to be in church every Sunday & involved in small group ministries – because if you’re not around, how can our young people catch your faith? We first have to be exposed - sort of like the way you catch measles - you have to be exposed.

Were you exposed to faith as a child? I sure was. My parents were right in the middle of everything at our little country church, McCroskie Creek Baptist Church. Every Sunday morning we were there for Sunday school and worship, and on Sunday nights we went back for Training Union and evening worship. On Wednesday nights we were there for prayer meeting. Scattered through the weekdays were Deacons’ meetings for Daddy and Women’s Missionary Union meetings for Mother. When I was old enough there were Girl’s Auxiliary meetings for me. My brother and I were exposed to faith – sometimes we thought we were a little overexposed!

But it wasn’t just from our little church that we caught faith. Like Paul remembers in his greeting to Timothy above, I inherited the faith from my mother Rachel and my grandmother Lura and her mother Molly before her, and even the generations I never knew. (Not to omit my father, Stanley, who comes from another line of the faithful.) When I go home this summer it will be like crawling back into a cradle of faith where I was rocked as a child. I didn’t much care for the strictness of it, but to this day I cherish its constancy and its centrality to who we are as family.